Obamacare in deep deep trouble

AK Forty Seven · Mar 28, 2012

Quote from Max E. Pad:

I remember when Obama tried to pass Obamacare...... it got struck down by the supreme court....

You must be posting from the future

You righties are going to shocked when its upheld

377OHMS · Mar 28, 2012

Quote from Max E. Pad:

I remember when Obama tried to pass Obamacare...... it got struck down by the supreme court....

lol.

Denial
Anger
Acceptance

pspr · Mar 28, 2012

Quote from 377OHMS:

lol

How you liking it now?

So much for "Historic Achievment" and "Landmark Legislation".

Obama has failed in every regard.

Exactly. Obama has failed at every turn. 4 years wasted and just deeper in skyrocketing debt because of liberal failures.

Max E. · Mar 28, 2012

Quote from AK Forty Seven:

You must be posting from the future

With the possibility of Obamacare being struck down, the future is so bright i got to wear shades.....

jem · Mar 28, 2012

Quote from AK Forty Seven:

Again,Cant wait to bump this thread when the USSC upholds it

Didn't you predict that the birthers would never get a hearing? That makes you about 1 for 2 in legal predictions by my count.

I would argue I am 1 for 2 but I was strongly hedged on my loss.

Perhaps you wish to hedge here.

AAAintheBeltway · Mar 28, 2012

Quote from jj90:

I would like to understand the issue of Obamacare being so widely unpopular from the perspective of a non-American and coming from a nation which has universal health care. I fully admit that I only have a superficial following of US politics. My understanding from the media here and research online is that the main opposition points is that:

1)It forces people to get coverage, and is seen as unconstitutional.
2)It increases the money spent by individuals on healthcare.

From my perspective, it doesn't make sense not to have universal healthcare or something approaching that. For those that can easily pay medical costs themselves, the increase in premium will be negligeble anyways. But for those who cannot find the means to pay, this would appear to be a lifesaver. I fail to understand why anyone would choose to not be covered under health insurance anyways.

From my understanding, the legislation basically forces people to get coverage, although subsidized, from private healthcare institutions and for that I agree is a huge flaw. Over here the coverage is through the government adminstered institutions rather, and that would probably make more sense. But perhaps the social cost to not giving people this standard of living is greater than the deficit in spending by the plan?

Please shed some light and correct me where wrong.

I can understand your confusion. Our system of insurance and government is no doubt vastly different. Let's begin with the law itself and why a lot of people object to it.

You have to understand that the existing system works perfectly well for the vast majority of people. Most insurance is provided by employers, with employees usually paying a portion of the cost. It is an historical anomaly, instituted during WW II to avoid wage and price controls. It would be a good idea to change it, as people often are reluctant to change jobs because theywould lose their coverage and might have a condition that would make it difficult to get replacement coverage. Obamacare does nothing to address this issue however, other than to make it more expensive for employers to provide coverage.

The other major problem concerns cost shifting. Hospitals are required to treat any sick person who shows up. They incur enormous costs, typically from treating illegal aliens, and attempt to pass those costs onto other users. Insurance companies of course resist. Hence, any real reform has to address this issue. Obamacare does it by forcing insurers to cover anyone who asks for coverage and prohibits them from charging more on the basis of, eg age or medical condition. This might be an unconstitutional taking standing alone, but Obamacare attempts to balance it by forcing everyone to have coverage or pay a fine.

Those are the basics. Unfortunately there are another 2000 or so pages of the legislation that few if anyone really knows what it does. Details are coming out bit by bit and are not encouraging. In total, the law represents an enormous expansion of the federal government's role in health insurance, and for many, it seems an obvious nose under the tent in preparation for a full takeover later.

Being conditioned to a government-run system, you probably don't see why people would object, but suffice to say there are vast concerns over cost, access to care, rationing and a myriad of other issues. I can see how a socialized system would be fine in say, Finland. Here, we would have half the population of mexico streaming in for care, not to mention the urban welfare class, who could be expected to swamp such a system with basically infinite demands.

The legal case is based on the proposition that the federal government's powers to regulate interstate commerce do not extend to compelling people to buy insurance. The reach of the commerce clause of the Constitution is a complex area of law, and the Supreme Court's past decisisons are all over the map.

The Court is also hearing a related challenge involving a part of the law that forces states to spend vastly more on Medicaid, which is a health care welfare program for "poor" people. I use quotes because the law apparently stretches the definition of "poor" to families making solid middle class incomes. The challenge here involves an even more esoteric area of Constitutional Law, the Tenth Amendment, which reserves for the states all powers not expressly granted to the federal government.

It is hard to overstate the stakes involved in these challenges. If the government loses, the progressive cause will have been dealt a crippling if not mortal blow. If they win, it is difficult to envision any area of life that the government cannot control, making the Constitution basically irrelevant.

AK Forty Seven · Mar 28, 2012

Quote from jem:

Didn't you predict that the birthers would never get a hearing? That makes you about 1 for 2 in legal predictions by my count.

I would argue I am 1 for 2 but I was strongly hedged on my loss.

Perhaps you wish to hedge here.

I said looney birthers or birther bull shit would never get Obama out office and that every birther case would be tossed out...I'm around 76-0 in my predictions

You are the one who keeps predicting that the birther bull shit will eventually get Obama out of office.You are around 0-76

jem · Mar 28, 2012

Quote from AK Forty Seven:

I said looney birthers or birther bull shit would never get Obama out office and that every birther case would be tossed out...I'm around 76-0 in my predictions

You are the one who keeps predicting that the birther bull shit will eventually get Obama out of office.You are around 0-76

Wow you not only rewrite politics you rewrite personal history. Do you copy Lawrence ODonnell. About 75 of those cases happened before you ever made a prediction here on et. Correct?

Don't make go back and find your quotes about how birthers would never see the inside of a court room or get a trial or something along those lines. I know your wrote such flippant stuff.

377OHMS · Mar 28, 2012

Quote from AAAintheBeltway:

I can understand your confusion. Our system of insurance and government is no doubt vastly different. Let's begin with the law itself and why a lot of people object to it.

You have to understand that the existing system works perfectly well for the vast majority of people. Most insurance is provided by employers, with employees usually paying a portion of the cost. It is an historical anomaly, instituted during WW II to avoid wage and price controls. It would be a good idea to change it, as people often are reluctant to change jobs because theywould lose their coverage and might have a condition that would make it difficult to get replacement coverage. Obamacare does nothing to address this issue however, other than to make it more expensive for employers to provide coverage.

The other major problem concerns cost shifting. Hospitals are required to treat any sick person who shows up. They incur enormous costs, typically from treating illegal aliens, and attempt to pass those costs onto other users. Insurance companies of course resist. Hence, any real reform has to address this issue. Obamacare does it by forcing insurers to cover anyone who asks for coverage and prohibits them from charging more on the basis of, eg age or medical condition. This might be an unconstitutional taking standing alone, but Obamacare attempts to balance it by forcing everyone to have coverage or pay a fine.

Those are the basics. Unfortunately there are another 2000 or so pages of the legislation that few if anyone really knows what it does. Details are coming out bit by bit and are not encouraging. In total, the law represents an enormous expansion of the federal government's role in health insurance, and for many, it seems an obvious nose under the tent in preparation for a full takeover later.

Being conditioned to a government-run system, you probably don't see why people would object, but suffice to say there are vast concerns over cost, access to care, rationing and a myriad of other issues. I can see how a socialized system would be fine in say, Finland. Here, we would have half the population of mexico streaming in for care, not to mention the urban welfare class, who could be expected to swamp such a system with basically infinite demands.

The legal case is based on the proposition that the federal government's powers to regulate interstate commerce do not extend to compelling people to buy insurance. The reach of the commerce clause of the Constitution is a complex area of law, and the Supreme Court's past decisisons are all over the map.

The Court is also hearing a related challenge involving a part of the law that forces states to spend vastly more on Medicaid, which is a health care welfare program for "poor" people. I use quotes because the law apparently stretches the definition of "poor" to families making solid middle class incomes. The challenge here involves an even more esoteric area of Constitutional Law, the Tenth Amendment, which reserves for the states all powers not expressly granted to the federal government.

It is hard to overstate the stakes involved in these challenges. If the government loses, the progressive cause will have been dealt a crippling if not mortal blow. If they win, it is difficult to envision any area of life that the government cannot control, making the Constitution basically irrelevant.

Excellent.

The mechanism right now is that hospitals are required by federal law to treat people who show up even if those people have no insurance coverage and no cash to pay for treatment.

Since the hospital must treat these people they pass those costs on to the rest of us by increasing the cost for services. So we all pay for the uninsured and those unable to pay cash for medical treatment.

So when you hear that "20% of people in the USA have no medical coverage" the fact is that they still receive treatment. The cost of that treatment causes the cost of treatment for all to increase.

Obamacare sought to force everyone, including healthy people, to pay premiums for health insurance. The theory was that since everyone would be covered the costs of medical treatment would decrease. But almost every objective study of medical costs, including the OMB, said that the costs for services would increase, not decrease and that the premiums would increase. Additionally the goverments costs for setting up the insurance exchanges required by the Obamacare law would be astronomically expensive and those costs would be paid for by taxpayers. Since it appears that the individual mandate will be ruled Unconstitutional the government cannot force healthy people to pay the insurance premiums so the insurance companies cannot profit and would presumably leave the business.

So the original system *did* provide healthcare for everyone and the quality of that care is very high in the United States. I think we'll just go on like this for awhile but it is possible that in the future some other universal healthcare schema will be proposed.

What people hated about Obamacare was the way the legislation was passed. It was rammed down our throats and now it is dead. Obama really pissed off alot of people with this law and many of them will express that dissatisfaction in November. It didn't help that Pelosi stuck her nose into the air and dismissed the concerns of 350 million people and didn't even read the legislation.

AK Forty Seven · Mar 28, 2012

Quote from jem:

Wow you not only rewrite politics you rewrite personal history. Do you copy Lawrence ODonnell. About 75 of those cases happened before you ever made a prediction here on et. Correct?

Don't make go back and find your quotes about how birthers would never see the inside of a court room or get a trial or something along those lines. I know your wrote such flippant stuff.

I'm not about to get into another 100 page birther argument with you birther jem so I will say to you what I have said to you multiple times before and leave it at that

Looney birthers will never get Obama of office .Obama will be on every state ballot for the 2012 election

It will go to court again because of birther loons like orly tatiz will continue to abuse our court system with birther bull shit but she will lose just like every case she has brought she has lost